Cross-training for the Cross-brained Bird
by Fireblazezz
Summary: Okosan is depressed because of boredom, and so Hiyoko wishes to help him and makes him participate in a cross-training race. But when she is to give him the healthy nutrients that she got from the doctor, she appears to mess things up a little... But surely grave consequences can't follow due to that...?
1. The Depressed Pudding-Lover

**After being engulfed in the wondrous story of Hatoful Boyfriend, and whilst eagerly awaiting the chance to get my hands on HolidayStar, I just felt the urge to write a story of it... so, here it is. And anyone who hasn't played the game is highly recommended to do it; it is by far one of the most original and fantastic visual-novels I have seen in a long time.**

***W~W means break ^.^**

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**The Depressed Pudding-Lover**

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**Tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap...**

**Tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap...**

**Tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap...**

... It never ceased. Not for one, single second did it cease, the tapping sounds of Okosan as he ran his stiff feathers across the surface of his desk, back and forth, back and forth. He had been doing so ever since they took their seats, and despite having received warnings from the teacher as well as some of the now-very irritated and tense classmates, the idiosyncratic fantail pigeon showed no intention of laying off in his addictive feather movements.

**Tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap...**

**Tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap tap... **

He was sitting on his chair like everyday, glancing right one second and then glancing left the next second, restlessly, while continuing to tap his feathertips on the desk, ever so anxiously. Over and over and over...

...

Okay, being the very peculiar bird he was, that was one thing; anyone who knew Okosan and his unique personalitytraits would obviously not find anything weird in him getting a little fidgety durig class, as he literally was a bird made of overwhelming energy, but this was different: This was a little _too _much, even for someone as hyper and restless as Okosan. And Hiyoko knew this, she knew this perfectly well because she was perfectly sure, 100% sure that during all of their classes up til this day, Okosan had never done anything like this, no matter how eager to skip class he'd ever been. In fact, usually he would simply fall fast asleep on his desk and snore his way through boredom, and so Hiyoko sometimes wondered if the "dull classes" were the only times when Okosan would find himself able to relax. She had little doubts concerning her theory, but if that _was _the fact, then how come he was behaving like this, right now?

No matter how long or hard the young hunter-gatherer pondered on this, the only reasonable explanation she could find was that Okosan must be grossly upset about something. Yes, that had to be it, she was sure of it. Though she had no idea what he could possibly be upset about at the moment, besides not yet having found the pudding of seven colors, or whatever it was... but that hadn't exactly agitated him before.

**Tap tap tap tap tap tap tap...**

"GAH! For God's sake!" A familiar voice bellowed just as I had begun to think in my mind that it was getting a little depressing to watch Okosan do what he was doing. And the owner of that loud voice was a very, very, very pissed Shirogane Le Bel Sakuya, who would seem to have grown quite tired of these obnoxious noises as he literally flung right around in his chair to glare daggers and laserbeams at the other fantail. "Oko! I demand you control whatever nerve-twitching issues you may have and silence your unworthy fantail feathers at this moment!"

Sakuya was pointing at his classmate with a stiff index feather, his face expression as stern as a rock, and he bared his beak in frustration; he looked as if prepared to resort to very drastic and brutal measures, and Hiyoko quickly questioned herself whether she should take action herself to prevent a somewhat bloody scenario; Fortunately, Nanaki-sensei seemed to have the same thing in mind as he looked up from his pile of papers and calmly, though fastly opened his mouth and spoke in an earnest tone: "Shirogane-kun, please turn back around and face this way, and refrain from mortally wounding your loveable comrade, as I can assure you that vital consequences will follow, for you as well as your poor, responsible teacher."

At the moment, Hiyoko's hunter-gatherer instincts told her to keep quiet, and so she did. But she was all ready to jump into action if anything were to happen, of course; though her reliable teacher seemed to have the situation under control as Hiyoko watched as Sakuya, perhaps a little reluctantly and after a few seconds of tense hesitation, finally bit his lower lip sorely and slowly sat back around. He looked very sombre, though.

"And Oko-kun," Nanaki-sensei continued kindly, "please stop doing that. It is a rather bothersome noise, and it disrupts your classmates' ability to focus on their work."

And indeed, Okosan ceased tapping the desk just a few seconds later. Amazing! Hiyoko smiled in admiration towards the math teacher before she too returned to her workbook. _Nanaki-sensei really knows how to handle his students, _she mused, smirking vaguely as she solved the equations on the page. _Even though normally you'd think he was just some quite lazy-looking-_

Hiyoko didn't get the chance to finish her thought, as she was interrupted by a new series of sounds, predictably coming from Okosan's desk:

**Peck peck peck peck peck peck peck...**

As Hiyoko listened to many classmates' sighing, and as she turned her head to look Okosan's way, this time she found him _pecking_ with his _beak _on the desk. Somewhere ahead of her, she caught the noise of something being snapped in half, and she assumed that Sakuya was taking out his suppressed wrath on his pencil or something alike; her instincts warned her of a something that reminded her of a violent volcano eruption and she nervously chose not to look Sakuya's way, praying silently that she wouldn't get caught in the crossfire that almost certainly would arise if Okosan didn't stop.

"Oko..." Sakuya began warningly, with a dark undertone that gave Hiyoko the chills. But wow, was he really this upset, Okosan? Hiyoko frowned hard as she wondered what might have happened; yesterday he had been just fine, right? Or... hadn't he been behaving rather restlessly yesterday too? For what reason? She had no friggin' idea.

"Oko, if you don't stop _right now, _I swear I will take your fine feathertips and..." Sakuya continued, somewhat louder, but he trailed off when Okosan, to Hiyoko's immense surprise (possibly Sakuya's as well), quit the tapping, and everything was nice and quiet again, and there was no reason for Hiyoko to die horribly in the blast of fury which Sakuya surely would've unleashed at Okosan. Yaaaay!

...

...

...

...

...

... ... ... **Peck peck peck peck peck peck-**

"WHAAAGH!"

Hiyoko's body reacted before her mind did, and she threw herself down on the floor just as the workbook that the raging Sakuya sent flying soared past her head and just barely brushed her scalp before it continued forward and whacked Okosan straight-on with a loud, hard, painful _thud. _

W~W

"Are you sure you're ok, San? That was some blow you took... hurts just thinkin' about it." Hiyoko suppressed a quiver as she sat beside her friend outside the infirmary, watching Okosan with a compassionate but alarmed expression as the fantail pigeon suspiciously eyed the bottle containing "a potion that will most certainly kill his undesired capacity of feeling pain" of which he had been given from the doctor just now.

He didn't take his eyes off of it as he replied: "Coo cooo! (Hiyoko shouln't worry about Okosan! Okosan is strong and sustained and will not suffer any sort of injury from a stupid book like that! Oh, no!)"

_... Is it really the book that matters? _Hiyoko couldn't help but think, but she didn't speak her mind. "That's good, buddy," is what she said with a smirk curling her lips, and she truly meant it. "Wouldn't want you getting hurt... That Sakuya should be ashamed, though. I mean, throwing a book at you was to cross the line, don't you think? And he didn't even use his own book," she added, recalling Sakuya brashly snatching the book of the guy next to him before hurling it at Oko... though she should also be happy that she herself wasn't hit.

"Coo coo. (Okosan was making noises, Okosan understands. And Okosan never meant to upset his classmates.)," Okosan said, and Hiyoko was deeply apprehensive to trace the depression in her friend's voice. Not only did it make her worry for him loads, but it also alarmed her a great deal as there were very few occasions of when she had actually witnessed this hyperactive and optimistic bird with a sad face. She had no doubts about there being something wrong anymore, and all she wished right now was to help her friend. And what other way was there than try to make him open up to her?

"Okosan..." she began, as kindly and indifferently as she could. "I've known you for quite some time now, and... well, believe me when I say that I realize that something is wrong. Concerning you, I mean."

Okosan sat quite still, and he no longer seemed to be eyeing the tiny bottle in his feathers; he seemed rather distant, looking at something without seeing it, but he also appeared to be listening to her speech, and so Hiyoko took her chance and pressed on: "Ah... you know you can talk to me, right?" she said, smiling kindly. "Anything you want, or wonder, you can talk to me about it. All I want is to help you, but you know that already, don't ya, bud?"

Okosan blinked, and Hiyoko could _almost _catch a glimpse of the shadow of an enlightening spark in his eyes, and to her relief she could see that he was slowly starting to resemble his usual self.

She was going to risk going a little further, as she was still egoistically curious about what could have made Okosan the Scatterbrain act like this. "Do you... um... do you perhaps want to tell me about why you were acting strange earlier?" she asked carefully, hoping that she wasn't betraying his trust by asking.

Fortunately, Okosan turned and gazed at her without looking the tiniest bit hurt, and it looked just like all of his hesistance had gone away, just like that. "Coo coo, cooo! (Hiyoko is indeed a very kind person, and she has chased away Okosan's unfriendly dark thoughts of hesistance! Okosan feels better already, but there is indeed something troubling him and he might feel even better if he tells good friend about it! Does the fair maiden really wish to talk about this?)" he said, gazing at her intently.

Hiyoko beamed at him. "But of course!" she exclaimed, moving closer so that she would be able to lend him a ear in case he intended to whisper; she could feel her curiousity growing, as well as her desire to help him. "Well? What is it?" She was kind of expecting him to tell her one weird thing or another, and she no longer thought that anything coming from his beak would be capable of shocking her, not at this moment. And so as Okosan spo.. cooed, she listened eagerly:

"Cooo coo coo! (My deepest sorrow is at hand, Hiyoko! No, nothing has happened to my ideals of pudding, do not worry; no, something else has happened, something very horrible, very horrible indeed... Yes... I am very... very...)"

Hiyoko strained her ears and listened intently, her expectations rising with her pulse as seconds of tension and excitement passed by. "You're..?"

"Cooo... coooo...! (Very... very... very...!)"

"Yes...?!"

"Coo coo coo! (Very, very, very, very...!)

...

...

...

...

...

"Bored."

...

Deadpan.

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**Please R&R and tell me what you think, and feel absolutely free to help me make this story better by correcting and giving me tips! :)**


	2. The Cross-country Cylinder

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**The Cross-country Cylinder**

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...

...

"... You're.. Bored, you say...?" Hiyoko managed to ask, quite slowly as she was still trying to let her brain digest the answer.

"Coo coo! (Yes, indeed! Okosan is very bored, indeed he is, yes indeed, yes!)" Okosan cooed loudly, and in the blink of an eye he appeared to have regained all of his steroidic excess energy; he rushed to his feet and stood pridefully on the plastic chair with his beak held high, his white wings extending above Hiyoko's head majestically as he cooed: "Cooooo! (Okosan's body is overflowing with passion! He needs something to channel this... infuriating power out of his body! But, as horrible as it might sound," he coontinued drastically, "the after-school sports activities, including any free running exercises for the track team, have been cancelled!"

The horrified and agonized expression that Okosan gave her was downright patronizing. Hiyoko probably would've thought that any pigeon getting depressed over something as trivial as the "sports activities being cancelled" would be something of a severely overreacting drama queen... But then again, she was also fully aware of the fact that Okosan was not your average pigeon, not even close to one. And Hiyoko was therefore fully able to comprehend that for someone like Okosan, any form of physical activity was vital, and he would naturally get really upset if they were to be taken from him. Speaking of which, he might even suffer some serious mental damage...

Having thought of that, now Hiyoko really wanted to help her friend. But how?

Okosan's agitated cooing disrupted her thoughts: "Coo coo! (Poor Okosan only wants something to stimulate him! That's all...!)" He gazed down at Hiyoko, and the young hunter-gatherer felt a pang of sympathy upon seeing his face, which was now painted in sorrow.

Hiyoko felt her comradeship-senses tingling, and her eyes automatically found their way to the billboard that hung on the wall on the other side of the corridor. She frantically scoured each and every one of the wallpapers for anything bearing any sort of resemblance to "something stimulating". And what do you know; merely a few seconds later, her gaze fixed on an interesting poster that read:

_"The Cross-country Cylinder -_

_An all-new race that will be inaugurated the 1st of May by the Captain of the LTAA (Leisure Time Activity Association), Hagetaka Baza himself!_

_This breathtaking course has taken 'racing' to a whole new level as the track's path forces you on an exclusively harsh, flashy, rigorous, chaotic and brain-erupting high-speed journey all over Japan, and through newly-discovered and dangerous special passages of which only the Captain and his closest men know of, that can break even the toughest of birds._

_Not too much about this race is to be disclosed in this humble advertisement, but we can ensure you that if you are a competitive competitor of the higher class who seeks a real challenge, then the Cross-country Cylinder is as more than a blessing from the heavens!"_

It wasn't even necessary to read the remaining paragraphs, for Hiyoko had gotten just as much information as she needed; the ingenious idea that just struck her triggered a wide smile on her lips, and it was with enthusiasm and triumph that she twirled around in her chair so that she was right underneath Okosan's beak. "That's right, I've got it! You'll enter the Cross-country Cylinder course!" she exclaimed right in his face.

And Okosan, who was momentarily taken aback by her sudden movement, tilted his head and met her glowing gaze, uncomprehending. "Coo coo? ('the What-country What what?)" he mimicked.

"Yes of course, Okosan! Don't you see what a great idea that is?!" Hiyoko breathed impatiently, and she realized that she was getting a little too excited about this thing and tried to tranquilize her nerves before continuing, inhaling deeply. "Um... the Cross-country Cylinder is the name of a race, apparently," she explained, casting a swift glance at the paper ad. "So wouldn't that be the greatest of great opportunities for you? I mean, since you're going nuts from your lack of physical activity-"

"COO COOO!" Okosan's shriek cut her off in the middle of the sentence, and it was so blatantly clamoroused and inarticulate that Hiyoko wasn't even able to catch its translated significance. "COO! (YES! An excellent idea, Hiyoko!)" he exclaimed, and he looked entirely prepared to spread his wings and take off from the ground. "Coo coo! (No, a brilliant idea! A full-fledged race is exactly was Okosan needs in his current state!)"

"Right?" Hiyoko nodded in agreement. "And on top of that, according to that ad over there, it's held only thrice a year. You just can't let this chance slide, Okosan."

Telling him that turned out to have been a total waste of words, as the crazy fantail already appeared to be gushing with excitement and rock-hard resolution, and he seemed to positively and unyieldingly have set his mind on entering this race. And the overjoyed beam of satisfaction of which he gave her was in turn more than enough to curl Hiyoko's lips into a wide and equally happy smile, for the young girl was sure that she would have to tarry for many, many days before she would even catch the faintest glimpse of that sad face from a few minutes ago. And quite honestly, that inflicted her more happiness than Okosan's participation in this race would probably ever do.

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**Short chapter, I know; I'm uploading this directly from Wattpad, you see ;) Please tell me what you think!**


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